I was hooked after the first two minutes. Got Netflix for this month just to show that yes I would like more of this please. I really like the (growing?) sci-fi tendency of describing one mind's experiences inside another's mind (mind-sharing devices, visions from dead people through their eyes by eating their brains, flesh golems for remote-access bodies, other such things), and this is exactly what I want from a television series. At first I was a bit annoyed or maybe confused about why everyone spoke English, but I understood later that that's just a convenience and they're "actually" speaking whatever their native language is. This is stretched a bit thin in the last episode where they apparently "actually" spoke English when I think they would not have. It's very possible I'm thinking too hard about this.

Anyway. I would have liked more languagey bits like the scene where Will accidentally speaks Korean and such. Very minor complaint. The way the show deals with gender and race and culture and minds is fantastic in my opinion. I'm probably going to rewatch it before my Netflix runs out.

Spoiler:

I'm very curious how birthing a new cluster works, hope that becomes a plot point in the next season.

The first season definitely leaves a lot of loose ends that I'd like to see tied up.

Speculations and thoughts spoiled under (season 1 spoilers).

Spoiler:

So Whispers is inside Will's brain now, how are they going to deal with that? They can't keep him sedated forever, nor does it seem like they have the resources to keep him in a room where he can't identify his surroundings when awake, so they'll have to find a way to deal with Whispers. I'm curious as to how they intend to do that and I hope it's not just some kind of asspull.

Will Riley's abilities ever become useful to the rest? They've shown that all the others have some very distinctive abilities that are extremely useful in emergencies, Sun can fight, Kala does science, Will can lockpick and use police tactics, Lito is good at lying, Wolfgang is crazy, can fight and crack safes, Capheus can drive and Nomi can hack like a motherfucker. Riley can...play music? Has perfect pitch? Is highly resistant to drugs? I'm not saying she necessarily needs a skillset, but I'm a bit curious as to if they're going to present her with one or if she's allowed to just be who she is?

I also really like how they keep people's partners around after the people figure out they're part of the cluster. Usually, in tv-series and shows where these things happen relationsships get strained and they're forced to set out on their own or stick to the people they're linked to. In this Nomi gets to keep her Amanita and Lito gets to keep his Hernando and I find that really cool. Also family is kept around, Will's dad, Capheus mum, Riley's dad, Kala's whole family etc. Only Wolfgang seems to be left to himself, but it doesn't seem out-of-place for the character.

Another thing I'm looking forward to figuring out is how Sun's imprisonment is going to be dealt with. Is she going to spend the rest of the series in jail or will it become important to get her out? Every episode since she got jailed I've spent being constantly worried that she'll be discovered for what she is and the bio-dudes are going to come cut her open. I mean they seem to be able to do whatever they want and she's not exactly got anywhere to run/hide while in jail.

Also can I say that I just love Capheus? Ever since the first time he went "I have a feeling, today is going to be a good day" he's just been a constant source of positivity throughout the show. I'm a bit unsure if it's a stereotype-thing that I should be skeptical towards though, that he seems to be the one who's materialisticly worst off, yet have the most "I can do this"-attitude.

I love this show, from the first episode right to the last. Binge-watching the season might have something to do with it and I can't wait to see the next season. Hopefully they make it.

At first I picked favourites (Coming this summer: Sun beats up everyone), but I've come to like all characters. They may not all be badass, funny, strong, etc., but they all play their role and they play it well.

Finished the show over the weekend and I really liked it. The ending was a bit sudden but I'd rather have it this way than rush the final episode by trying to cram too much stuff in it. I like how they used the sensate abilities to keep the characters connected while keeping their individual stories and problems relevant and interesting instead of getting everyone to obsess over their abilities. I also liked how each character had their unique reaction to the newly discovered abilities but a few of them could have stood to be a little more impressed/concerned with what was happening. I also also liked (I liked the show a lot ) how each character had a different genre to their story but they flowed into each other quite naturally.

Has a second season been confirmed? About the whole season/speculation for next one:

Spoiler:

So six of the eight individual storylines are resolved now. I wonder if Sun and Kala will have more of a focus next season. There were some hints early on in the season about a connection between Sun's company (doing some shady finance with pharmaceuticals), Kala's pharmaceutical company, the diamonds Wolfgang stole (something about them coming from India) and Caffeus' use of unknown drugs.

For a while, I thought they'd somehow been selected to form a cluster because of their involvement with this mystery but then Jonas spouted that gibberish about them being a different kind of human (X-men mutants?) that were born simultaneously and can only form a cluster with each other. I really hope he was lying because that whole "you are special because you are capable of empathy and are biologically only capable of bonding with each other" really didn't sit well with me.

AngrySquirrel wrote:

Spoiler:

Another thing I'm looking forward to figuring out is how Sun's imprisonment is going to be dealt with. Is she going to spend the rest of the series in jail or will it become important to get her out? Every episode since she got jailed I've spent being constantly worried that she'll be discovered for what she is and the bio-dudes are going to come cut her open. I mean they seem to be able to do whatever they want and she's not exactly got anywhere to run/hide while in jail.

Spoiler:

My impression was that detecting someone is a sensate requires a very thorough physical examination by someone who knows what they are looking for. Riley was only in danger because she grew up in Iceland and the bad guys already had her genetic information so they knew she was a sensate and were watching out for her getting admitted to a hospital. I have no clue how they discovered Nomi though. Maybe something linked to her transition?

I really hope they work together to get her released from prison next year. As it stood, this season was really heavy on the Riley problems and Sun kicking ass. Not that one of them needing more help or being able to provide more help than the others is a bad thing but I'd like to see Sun solve a problem through something other than being an unstoppable badass.

I guess we are already set up so that Will will need the most help next season but... eh. His story was already the weakest of the eight because he was just investigating Angel's death (which got nowhere) and falling in love with Riley.

You, sir, name? wrote:Seen about two episodes now. Every other scene has been people having sex.

You say that as if it's a bad thing lol

Well, there's such a thing as too much of a good thing.

Anyway, I've watched the entire thing. The sex to plot ratio did improve in episodes 2+. Overall, I'm impressed. The characters felt a lot more real than in a lot of shows I've watched. Also, I like how the viewer was left to infer a lot of what was going on, where other shows would treat the viewer as an idiot that needs to be force fed huge quantities of exposition.

I think they somewhat overdid the HBTQ-angle a bit. I'm not really offended by it, but it was a bit in-your-face.

You, sir, name? wrote:Anyway, I've watched the entire thing. The sex to plot ratio did improve in episodes 2+. Overall, I'm impressed. The characters felt a lot more real than in a lot of shows I've watched. Also, I like how the viewer was left to infer a lot of what was going on, where other shows would treat the viewer as an idiot that needs to be force fed huge quantities of exposition.

Yeah, I was really glad there wasn't a "Previously on Sense8" every new episode, especially since I'm at home sick, binge watching it The credits felt unnecessarily long though, 2 minutes, really?

You, sir, name? wrote:I think they somewhat overdid the HBTQ-angle a bit. I'm not really offended by it, but it was a bit in-your-face.

I know what you mean. I'm not offended either, I can't really place it either, but I felt they were really politically correctly gaying it up at times. Maybe it had also to do with the fact that the only two romantic relationships that are stable, mutual and supportive were the gay and lesbian relationships. Hell, they were also the only people who believed they were connected to other people without considering them crazy.

Spoiler:

Or it was the wet rainbow-colored strap on dildo

Anyway, what I'm wondering now, is where did BDO get their influence?

Spoiler:

A patient running from brain surgery (which she herself did not authorize nor agree to) seems like a task for local police at best, not the FBI taking orders from Whispers. And did she just have the bad luck to run into Metzger? As I understood it, the differences are quite specific and any normal neurologist would not recognize the symptoms.

Is Jonas working with Whispers voluntarily or is he forced. I'm not quite clear. And how is Yrsa (the Icelandic sensate) able to work for BDO without getting turned into a remote controlled meat puppet?

Also curious how they are going to keep Whispers out of Will's head, without doping him up the entire time. And shouldn't that connection work both ways, so Will can annoy Whispers as well?

Zohar wrote:I've of seen the first episode but I have to say I'm not impressed. I might watch another episode. I just hope the group of people starts calling themselves The Sensations.

They start being called "Sense 8s" (okay, sensates) which is really annoying to hear. I also wasn't impressed. It felt like everything was just dragging; the main story barely progressed, and the side stories just felt a bit off, and almost everyone is involved with major criminals for some reason, completely separate from anything related to the main story. Also, the dialogue was pretty bad at times, and some of the characters were basically every stereotype ever. That said, some of it was interesting, and the fight scenes were cool.

Also, the hacker technobabble...

Behold your only true messiah. An entity of which you're a part.A vast and cold indifferent being. A grey clad mass without a heart.

I've since seen a few more episodes (2-4 I think?) and it's gotten considerably better. There are still a lot of issues I'm bothered with - the English (I hear that's used in an interesting way though), a lot of the dialog is kind of grating, a lot of cultural weirdness (Indian girl's praying to Ganesha just like Christians pray to their god, weird westernizing of local customs, Nairobi guy being like "This is the bad area we shouldn't come here!" like they couldn't be bothered to actually find a real name or something). But at least the mystery is more interesting now.

The coolest part of the show is how they share minds and can help one another in time of need. That's... not really explored very well until the last few episodes. The show takes ENTIRELY too long to ramp up, and the first... I dunno... four? episodes move along at a snails pace, followed by... two more? episodes that are not terribly important feeling. To make matters a bit worse, what each person brings to the collective is kind of uneven - Sun and Will are used most frequently because they beat people up good.

The side stories and how they're used to reveal more of the characters capabilities and relationships were... ok, but could be smoother.

Ultimately, I feel like it's an awesome premise for a series/story, but felt that by the end of the season that nothing terribly significant had really happened other than the stage was set for conflict beyond each individuals personal tales.

Spoiler:

Will needs to, I guess, now be physically isolated from the rest until Whispers is dealt with? Why couldn't Whispers control Will the way he controlled Jonas?

But yes, hooray for a cool series that shows how varied people are and is unapologetic in exploring that.

... with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet.

Will needs to, I guess, now be physically isolated from the rest until Whispers is dealt with? Why couldn't Whispers control Will the way he controlled Jonas?

Spoiler:

Whispers couldn't control Jonas, he could just "visit" to share senses/see what he sees. Once they captured him, I believe he used some unspecified means (drugs? torture? hypnosis? who knows) to force him to help hunt down the sensates. It was left rather ambiguous how much Jonas resisted anyway.

Either way, Will now needs to be somewhere nondescript so Whispers can't figure out where he is by looking through his eyes.

No, I'm pretty sure Whispers controls the Sense8 he's seen eye to eye. That's the whole shtick with the lobotomized man suddenly standing and trying to assassinate Nomi, and Nomi seeing Whispers in the his reflection in the mirror.

My sense is that Whispers is trying to find Sense8's, lobotomize them, and use them as puppets to [evilthing].

... with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet.

Oh, yes, that part was definitely true but it doesn't mean he could control Jonas. It required some special procedure that effectively removes the sensate's consciousness (hence vegetative state) but leaves intact the machinery that allows Whispers to make contact.

Basically, I think Whispers has no chance of controlling Will right now but at the same time Will doesn't know how to block Whispers from visiting him (although it is possible because Angelica was doing it before she birthed the cluster). Basically, I expect Will will spend a lot of time visiting other people next season since it seems Whispers can't follow along with him.

Which reminds me of that giving birth to clusters thing. I am really confused how it works or why it is necessary. We later found out those eight people have been predetermined to be a cluster and always had a connection so Angelica didn't choose them and she hadn't ever seen any of them so how did she even connect to them?

I was a bit unclear on the depth of Whispers knowledge of the Sense8's he was piggybacking on. It seemed like Jonas was able to lie to him, but also maybe nooooooooot? I presumed that he could see anything Will could physically see, but not the shared experience with the other Sense8's. I.e., it's not mind reading.

... with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet.

I finished it a few weeks ago. Overall I liked it, and I'd be interested in seeing another season. I felt, like others, that the overarching story was the most interesting part. Although I enjoyed the shared experiences aspect a lot more than the global conspiracy ones. I would be overjoyed if the next season would be straight-up rom-com, but I doubt that will happen.

Of the individual stories, Lito's was the most interesting to me, specifically because Daniella is awesome and I love her.

No huge story spoilers but still:

Spoiler:

That said, there were a few things that bothered me, as I mentioned above. For instance, of course the East-Asian girl is the one who knows martial arts. I found it weird the one thing Capheus does is handling cars. It doesn't seem very impressive, and I'm sure cop-guy, forgot his name, already knows how to do that stuff. Also when cop guy who used to be a juvenile delinquent couldn't hot wire a car. Kala's story was grating (it's a marriage of love but it seems to be treated like an arranged one? and there were other things too). It's an uncomfortable coincidence that the most visually horrific story (sliced-up hands and so on) is the one in Africa. My husband knows quite a bit about Nairobi and says they don't really have the type of social and cultural problems described on the show, so it feels kind of like it's erasing African individuality.

For next season, I hope Wolfgang presents a disturbing force in The Sensations, dividing them somehow. He's very clearly drawn as bad person and I hope they don't ignore that in the future.

I didn't get the impression that Wolfgang was a *bad* guy, just a thief with a troubled past. I think he's a valid part of the whole group, very much part of the group, without neccesarily being a 'delightful ball of relentless positivity and self-sacrifice'. The point I felt was that the Sensate didn't mean they were all identical humans, just that they shared experiences with one another.

I got a little bored of the convoluted love triangle aspect of it, but meh.

... with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet.

I didn't mean that they all have to become, essentially, the same personality - that doesn't seem to be what's happening, either. I meant that he's definitely very violent and brutal, and he's chosen to do things that we'd consider "evil" if we saw anyone else doing them. He's done much worse things in the finale to his "family" than they've done to him or people close to him, at least numerically speaking, and he really didn't have to - he could have escaped or just given the diamonds back in return for them leaving his friend alone. He chose a violent path, and the fact that he's done something that's (to me) clearly anagonistic, and yet we understand him and feel empathy with him, shows the strength of the structure of the sensates, and how we see them as the protagonists. I'm all for complicated evil characters (Go Zuko!), and I think in this case he could definitely become a very destructive and offensive force. He's even described by Will (that's the name of cop guy, right?) essentially and a psychopath.

I dunno, I think giving the gangsters that killed his best friend would have been quite cowardly. There's a reason Leto fought off that girls abusive boyfriend, even though he could have just walked away from the situation. There's a reason Capheus didn't just walk away from the gangsters (the bad ones, not the rich one), why Sun didn't sell out her family, why Nomi kept hacking... A big theme in the story is that everyone has their own battles to fight, and depending on where you sit, those battles can all be considered justifiable.

So, of course Will initially frowned upon Wolfgangs actions - Will is a reformed thief and cop! If anything their relationship is going to be a great facet to the Sense8, because of how seemingly diametrically opposed their personality alignments are. I think that's a really rich part of the show, that very different people share their experiences and can see the legitimacy of those wants/needs. That's one of the reasons I loved a lot of the story - those shots of all of them collectively experiencing and enjoying something together, even though they all had very different life experiences and expectations.

Remember when Leto first acknowledges Will, and Will is like "I know you..." and Leto is like "Yes, we made love... it was... wonderful" and Will is taken aback and all flustered? We don't have any reason to believe Will is homophobic, but my impression was that was certainly outside of his comfort zone to be confronted with, but he went with it anyway.

... with gigantic melancholies and gigantic mirth, to tread the jeweled thrones of the Earth under his sandalled feet.

Lito. It's a diminutive of a full Spanish name, meant to sound cutesy/intimate (for example, Mikey instead of Michael). Usually applied to Carlos and Angel (Carlito=> little Carlos, so on and so forth used as an expression of endearment).

Belial wrote:That's charming, Nancy, but all I hear when you talk is a bunch of yippy dog sounds.

Season 2 started. I just saw the Christmas special and the first episode of the second season. Sensates have the best parties. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed this show. Can't quite explain why but it's not the main plot, more the interactions.

Spoiler:

I knew Will wasn't in Iceland because I could understand the language the delivery girl was speaking.

oh, right, the second season is out now. i found the premise of this show so incredibly intriguing and then its execution so awful; i'm still ambivalent about watching s2. i keep WANTING to love it SO much and then i just don't. the constant sledgehammering with exposition, the absolutely galling treatment of nearly every non-white character (unsurprising from the typically racist wachowskis)... but then it just has one of the most captivating premises of any show i have seen in a while and some actors i reeeally love so i keep hoping. maybe s2 will be better.

You want to know the future, love? Then wait:I'll answer your impatient questions. Still --They'll call it chance, or luck, or call it Fate,The cards and stars that tumble as they will.

Yeah the show is complicated. It's gratuitously hopeful, almost grotesquely optimistic. And like natraj said, kind of reeks of racism quite often. Like my husband's observation that all the people of color get the "exotic/primitive culture" stories (arranged marriage, dealing with local gangs, misogynist society, anti-gay sentiments) and all the white characters get the awesome sci-fi stories. With the except of boring German guy. In S1, the African dude's main contribution to the team was being able to drive.

That said, the show's still pretty exciting, and I enjoy watching it when it's ridiculously cheesy.

Zohar wrote:Yeah the show is complicated. It's gratuitously hopeful, almost grotesquely optimistic. And like natraj said, kind of reeks of racism quite often. Like my husband's observation that all the people of color get the "exotic/primitive culture" stories (arranged marriage, dealing with local gangs, misogynist society, anti-gay sentiments) and all the white characters get the awesome sci-fi stories. With the except of boring German guy.

I gotta question some of that awesome sci-fi story bit. Riley, Wolfgang and Capheus' stories are all pretty much criminal gang oriented, until Riley becomes some damsel in distress for the group to save. Nomi basically just a magically hacker with another touch of damsel in distress at the start. I'll grant Will probably has the "best" story but it's because his is the MAIN story. His own personal story is pretty underdeveloped frankly.

Riley had some other elements, yes, but very quickly switched to the overarching Whispers plot. The fact that she (or Nomi) is or isn't a damsel in distress is irrelevant. My point wasn't that their only story is the Whispers plot, and that they're not allowed other narratives - they obviously do get them. Will with his father, Riley with her father, Nomi with her mother and her partner. But they're the only ones that directly deal with the Whispers plot and the overarching mystery of the show. Maybe that changes later on in S2 (only seen the special and the 2nd episode), but it's pretty apparent so far.

Are you saying you feel like the white characters (minus the german, whom I don't find boring) get the main storyline while the people of color only get the side stories? (Stereotypical side stories at that.) I can see that. I've also read somewhere (don't remember where) and subsequently noticed that some of the locations seem better researched than others. San Francisco and Berlin are very recognizable and unique, while Mumbai or Nairobi could almost be any city in India or Africa respectively. This might be my personal ignorance/bias and perhaps natives will feel their cities are represented well.

On a related note (minor spoiler for season 2 episode 6):

Spoiler:

There's a new character from another cluster who just seems like a bad mixture of Scottish stereotypes. He wears a kilt, lives in a castle on a lakeside and has fried mars bar for desert. The kilt and the lakeside castle are classic stereotypes. The mars bar is such a 'thing I heard about Scotland once' though. That's something teenagers might eat on a night out, not a typical Scottish desert. It's like the show is saying: 'look, we can also not do research about white cultures'.

Yeah that's pretty much what I meant. Having not been to most places depicted in the show, I can't really comment on most of the locations. I'm sure budget concerns are at least part of the reason for this.

yeah and it's not even only that the white chars carry the story while the poc play support (though that's bad enough) but the personal stories the poc get are all very exotified/stereotyped. like, indian woman struggling with marriage for love vs family expectations? korean woman balancing her Duty To Her Family even though they are hella misogynistic to her? Brown People Are Homophobic? Generic African Slum is Full Of Gang Violence? honestly give me a break.

it's not that no people from these cultures face these problems, its that these representations are SO OFTEN the first and only thing white writers think about when imagining what struggles people from these cultures face. it's tired and insulting.

You want to know the future, love? Then wait:I'll answer your impatient questions. Still --They'll call it chance, or luck, or call it Fate,The cards and stars that tumble as they will.

buckling down and watching the second season now. i miss old capheus i suppose i will wait before judging new capheus.

there is a lot of eye candy s'true but german dude and cop look so generic and bland to me i can barely tell them apart if they have vaguely similar facial hairs. also lito is constantly so obnoxious through s1 that i have a hard time finding him attractive solely because he has all the personality of an extremely misogynistic wet sock.

also the holiday special-transformed-into-s2ep1 reminds me that all their weird mashup sensate orgy scenes are not even slightly sexy to me. i think i'd find them more aesthetically pleasing and less just jarring and offputting if they ever EVER really bothered to address the wiiicked dubious consent issues around sex when people you are nonconsensually irrevocably mentally linked to are dragged into the picture. maybe they'll do it this season? who knows.

this whole show is filmed veeery very prettily though. and nita is still the best character.

You want to know the future, love? Then wait:I'll answer your impatient questions. Still --They'll call it chance, or luck, or call it Fate,The cards and stars that tumble as they will.

I enjoyed the season as a whole, despite its flaws. The central idea remains cool enough and the interactions and connections between the sensates are definitely the best part.I think Toby Onwumere did a good job as Capheus. He’s quite different from the more enthusiastic Capheus Aml Ameen brought last season, but I liked the performance (more than the writing).

Spoiler:

I got confused by the election storyline, I have no idea what exactly he’s supposed to be running for. City council or something like that? President of Kenya? Something in between? He also seems to have zero agency this season. I was also disappointed by the end of Sun’s story. After all this buildup she just ends up back in jail? If she’d killed her brother at least we’d have that satisfaction.